algae editible oils

7/29/2019 Algae Editible Oils

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For the food world, fermentation provides flexibility, said Harrison. Farmers chose to grow different oilplants largely out of necessity. Palm trees don't grow well in the Midwest, so farmers there specialize insoybean oil instead. Even when possible, switching crops requires planning and plowing.

In an industrial fermenter, switching crops effectively involves cleaning out the fermenter and insertingthe desired mix of microorganisms and sugars.

Companies concentrating on food, water, and agriculture arerapidly gaining interest from investors,despite limited press coverage. The math is fairly compelling: the world's population is growing, currentcrops take inordinate amounts of energy and water to produce, and we're running out of land and water.

Another plus is these markets--along with themarkets for industrial oils--might be easier to crack thanthe transportation fuel business. Although Solazyme inked a research-and-development deal withChevron, getting a fuel company to commit to a new type of liquid fuel is a gargantuan task.Don Paul,CTO of Chevron, estimated last year that it takes about 15 years and $3 billon to develop a new liquidfuel.

Some people will likely recoil at the idea of buying algal cooking oil, but it probably won't taste like apond. The marketing departments in food processing giants will also likely work on some clever names,too. After all, if they just called health-food supplement Spirulina "water scum," it probably wouldn'thave sold either. (Conversely, you can drink biodiesel. I have. It takes like Wesson that's been left outfor a few days.)

And when the oil is extracted, Solazyme can sell the remaining byproducts.

"We can sell the non-oil biomass for animal feed," said Dillon.

Dillon and Wolfson both point out that Solazyme has been in business since 2003--well before theenergy investment craze--and have enlisted prominent academics such as molecular biologist DavidStern, of Cornell University, to work at the company or sit on its advisory board. (The company

originally planned to get into hydrogen production too, but gave up on that.)

In fact, you could say that the company goes back even further. Dillon and Wolfson met on their firstday of college back in the 1980s. They wanted to start a company together but had only a vague notionof what to do. Dillon went into biotechnology and ultimately also became a patent attorney. Wolfson gota law degree and an MBA and went into finance.

When the two first sought funds, most venture capital firms were intrigued by their idea, but didn't knowhow to position the company in their portfolio. Ultimately, investors shuttled the two to the partners whohandled pharma deals.
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